Even after all he had done to ruin her life and trample her heart and destroy her innocence, William Gerard had returned to Renwick—and he still wanted her. She knew she should summon a carriage and go home before she did something she would genuinely regret. She did not wish to join the dismal ranks of the legendary mistresses of Dredthorne and go mad.
Oh, but she could beat that horrid, spiteful swine of a man until his skull cracked, and never lose another moment’s peace over it.
Yanking open the door, Jennet walked out into the cold night air. It made every breath she took too sharp for comfort, but she welcomed the chill. Hopefully it would erase this blazing flush that had crawled up her neck into her face. Quickly she marched down the steps, determined to put as much distance between her and her tormentor as she could until she calmed.
How could he do this to her? She had been finished with him. Done. He had been forgotten entirely.
You came here hoping to see him, her sensibility whispered. Admit it.
Jennet came to the end of the paved pathway sooner than she expected, and stopped to survey her surroundings. Idly she fanned herself as she considered her prospects. She might continue through the fields beyond, for the moon had bathed them in silvery light. The shadowy outlines of a small building to her right suggested it to be a hot house, where she might conceal herself until her temper subsided, and she felt more like herself again. Even now her nape tingled madly, as if he were standing just behind her–
Jennet spun around to see the straw man striding rapidly toward her. She would have to keep up the pretense another moment, it seemed.
“Return to the ball, sir,” she told him, closing her fan with a snap. She felt proud of the haughty indifference in her tone. “I have finished with readings for the night.”
He came too close, and caught her arm when she would have passed around him. First he pulled away her mask, tossing it aside, and then tugged off the sacking shrouding his head. That confirmed her suspicions irrefutably.
Greystone was the straw man.
Jennet took in the measure of her former love. He seemed much older than the young man she had known. New lines bracketed his mouth and rayed out from the corners of his eyes; a small scar divided one of his winged brows. Streaks of silver glinted in the black hair at his temples, making him look more like this father than ever. The beard shadow that blued his jawline appeared quite heavier. His mouth had thinned and grown harder; his eyes had become hooded. He had been everything handsome when he had promised to wed her, but now he looked too big and battered to be William Gerard.
What he looked like was dangerous.
“Miss Reed.”
“Baron Greystone.” Jennet would not curtsey to him even if all of her leg bones snapped, but there was no one to witness her rudeness. “Pray excuse me. My friends will be wondering where I have got to.”
“A moment, please.” His voice had grown softer and deeper over the years, and brushed like silk velvet against her ears. “I wish to speak to you.”
Of course, he did. What he assumed he had was her interest, which she should squash this moment. “We have nothing to say to each other, sir.”
“You need only listen.” He hesitated before he took his hand from her arm. “I apologize, Miss Reed, for leaving you at the church. Please understand that I never intended to do you harm.”
Sorry. He was sorry.
Jennet stared at him. For the life of her she could not imagine why he would say such a thing. The man who had fled Renwick for parts unknown, never to return until tonight, thought he must now express regret to her. The lover who had convinced her to accept his heart before smashing hers so thoroughly, had decided to offer an apology. The cad who left her to face alone their families and friends and neighbors without even an inkling as to why he had fled, felt remorseful. Never mind that he had treated her with such contempt. He imagined these words would be enough to make up for what he had done to her. After all this time.
She had not gone mad. He had.
Almost as if she stood outside herself, Jennet could measure the rage that had been building inside her, which presently rose so quickly it burned through every feeling, every thought, every particle of her being. Once a small, eternal ember of resentment, perhaps, now grew to the like of an inferno. She felt curiously in awe of such scalding, destroying emotion; she would surely burst into flame at any moment. Dimly she heard the clatter of her fan as it dropped from her hand.
She had nothing to say to him, but everything to do.
“Jenny, do not–” was all he got out before he ducked to avoid her fist.
Jennet would have tried to hit him again, but he seized her as he straightened, and dragged her up against him. That he dared have the audacity to put his hands on her and press her to him astounded her. He behaved as if they had remained in love and married and never wished to be parted from each other. As if she belonged to him.
“You will release me, sir,” Jennet told the front of his shirt. “This instant.”
“I knew this to be a mistake.” He sounded as if he were talking to himself now. “I meant to keep my distance. I only thought… You have every right to hate me for what I did.”
“Hate you?” she echoed as she looked up into his evil, beautiful green eyes. “I could kill you.”
Greystone stared down at her as if she were a stranger. “Very nearly you did.”
“I think I should remember if I had tried.” Why could she not wrench herself away from him? He was holding her too tightly. “I wish to return to the ball.” When he kept his hands on her she gritted her teeth. “Let go of me, Liam, or I will scream.”
He did not let her go; indeed, he pressed her closer. Jennet could not bring her arms up to pummel him, so she opened her mouth and drew in a deep breath. In the next moment he covered it with his, muffling her shriek of fury with a kiss so carnal she should have fainted from the shock of being thus treated.
She would swoon later.
The night dissolved around Jennet as she clutched the rough fabric of his shirt, and then worked her hands up into his hair. Whoever had become Greystone no longer held her; this was Liam. The taste of him, the feel of his tongue, the heat of his breath mingling with hers, every part of the embrace hurled her back in time. Through the old silk of her costume she could feel his body hardening against hers, from the swell of his chest to the ridge of his manhood. Welcoming such desire made her own breasts pebble and ache, and her body soften as the onslaught of sensation radiated through her, snuffing out her wrath and replacing it with a need far more urgent.
Now she became his Jenny.
Greystone muttered something as he reached behind her, hefted her up against him and began to stride across the garden path. Jennet clung to him, hands and lips and legs, for she knew if she relinquished his kiss and took her hands from his long, thick mane she would collapse into a heap of ruin, never again to rise. Yes, this surely would end her, but such a glorious way to die.
Seven long, endless, barren years she had yearned for this.
She heard him yank open a door, sending a waft of warmer air over them both. She smelled flowers and greenery as he kicked the same door shut behind him. He swept his arm across something, and things rolled and shattered. He perched her on the cleared surface, and only then wrenched his mouth from hers.
Would he apologize again? If he did, she might truly have to take those gardening shears and stab him in his miserable heart.